Missives of a Baseball Milquetoast

I have a shorter post for this week as I had lots going on with friends in town for the recent run of Phish shows at Madison Square Garden and as I write this I am also packing for my first ever trip to Cleveland. The Arizona Diamondbacks are playing a three game set  at Progressive Field and I hope  to catch the first two games of the series. The inspiration for this week's post however has nothing to do with Cleveland or the Diamondbacks but rather National Pinball Day which is celebrated on August 1 as that is the birthday of pinball visionary, Roger Sharpe. The hat I've chosen to celebrate Sharpe is a Kannapolis Cannon Ballers hat because the cap design makes me think of a pinball in flight! I picked this cap up in 2022 so I imagine the sweatband tags should align with other caps from that year. After celebrating the Knicks and MSG with blue and orange last week, I'm back on my ususal program of paying homage to the US with a red, white and blue cap this week. I am look...

This week's  Fresh Fitted Friday post marks the second snapback I've written about this year and while that has been the average amount recently, looking back at years like 2015 and 2017 give a good glimpse into the kind of attention I have given to snaps previously. In retrospect, I could have also waited until tomorrow to share photos of this hat for a  Snapback Saturday post! Being retrospective is actually a driving force in selecting this particular snapback this week and folks who dig  deep into the archives also know that I have mentioned on multiple occasions that Phish is my favorite band and has been the inspiration for quite a few posts. A bit of reverence for the past is the reason Phish turned back the clock to 1992 with the song selection during the first night of its  current Madison Square Garden residency for their 92nd show at the legendary venue. C orrelating the songs chosen for their setlists with songs that were commonly played that year is a ...

If you have been telling stories long enough, you (and/or those around you) will eventually come to accept that repeat performances are inevitable, and as I approach the 15-year milestone of writing this blog, today's Fresh Fitted Friday post marks the first time I have featured the exact same cap for a second time. There are a few contrasting factors between both posts, with the notable being that today's photos were taken just a few years ago. Another difference is that this post is being published on a Friday, while the double feature post featuring a Brewers and Tigers hats from 1993 has a date stamp of Saturday, Oct. 8, 2011. Evidently, I did not make any note of it being "Fresh Fitted Friday" until my  1992 Seattle Mariners post on August 16, 2013 . It was fun revisiting that double feature post where I weighed in on the likelihood of a Brewers-Tigers World Series, especially considering neither team made it past the LCS that year. What I enjoyed even more wa...

The only time I feel listless during the baseball season is All-Star Week and that is because my options for watching baseball games become limited on the Monday leading into the All-Star Game up through the Friday following it. The Home Run Derby and All-Star Game are both fun events, but I miss having the full daily slate of games available where I can truly immerse myself. Perhaps I am dreading this year's Midsummer Classic because my San Francisco Giants 39-54 start is their worst since 2017, with that mid-season record being 35-56. Thankfully, the Colorado Rockies are just a smidge worse than the Giants this year, and they just happen to be in San Francisco for one final series before the break. Whether the Giants win or lose this series, I hope this week gives them an opportunity to reflect and recharge in preparation for the second half of the year. I do not expect them to have a miraculous turnaround; however, that would present a welcome set of new emotions for Giants fans...

Tomorrow is the United States' 250th anniversary and for beachgoers, the busiest weekend of the year will be extra amplified over this Fourth of July holiday weekend. Sadly, I won't be enjoying time by the ocean this weekend, but this week's Fresh Fitted Friday selection makes me feel like I'm there  but at least I did not have to need to  dig  deep for a topic for this post. The Jersey Shore BlueClaws debuted this new beach-coded alternate logo to commemorate their 25th anniversary season, which as it happens coincides with the United States celebrating its 250th birthday. I love that MILB caps have gone back to grey undervisors and hope the trend continues for many years to come. A large majority of the MLB caps I feature on this blog have a red, white, and blue batterman, but to me the stars seem to be shining extra bright here in tribute to the big birthday party happening for the U.S. tomorrow. I love minor league logos that incorporate baseball elements as well as...

After  posting to this blog for over a dozen years, I sometimes ask myself if I have run out of ideas to write about or if I am conveniently revisiting themes to the point of there no longer being a point in continuing on. And then there are moments when I consider the significance of those themes and the importance of continually reminding myself of the values that define me. Earlier this week I realized this coming Sunday was the NYC Pride March and instantly thought it would be fitting to feature a Charleston Rainbows hat for this week's Fresh Fitted Friday post. I wanted to know how long it had been since I had last written about the team so I dug through the archives only find  this post from almost exactly ten years ago , which was the first—and most recent—time I had written about the Rainbows. I felt chills reading my thoughts on the Pulse Nightclub shooting in 2016, which frankly is a sensation I expect to sense again in ten years when I think back on how the San Fra...